The tricks of the trade in ‘Now You See
Me’
“Sometimes people associate magicians
with that guy who shows up at kids’
birthday parties and waves his arms
around,” says producer Bobby Cohen.
“This is definitely not that.”
Publ.Date : 25 May 2013 00:00:00 -0700

James J. Morrissey Jr., 74, Magician,
Wayland Resident -Patch.com-
A fan of the Red Sox, sailing and Frank
Sinatra, Morrissey was also a lover of
magic and long-standing member of the
Society of American Magicians. He was
also active in the Wayland Republican
Town Committee and the Sudbury Bridges
Together program...
Publ.Date : 26 May 2013 00:00:00 -0700

Illusionist, trickster, magician: Inside
the mind of a man who can - The Province
But when he whisks open the door of his
airy rented apartment in Birmingham, all
the smoke and mirrors fall away. Brown
is nothing like the cape-whirling,
goatee-toting, caramel-voiced charmer we
see on stage and screen. For a start,
he’s shaved — not just his chin but his
head, too — and he’s wearing a very
sensible striped jumper and jacket. That
knowing smile is gone; replaced by a
meek grin that makes him seem almost
unsure of himself. He’s warm and
friendly and impeccably polite, pushing
open doors and pulling out chairs and
endlessly apologizing for dropping coins
from his pocket in a clattering heap...
Publ.Date : 27 May 2013 00:00:00 -0700

RIVERSIDE: Magic posters exhibit,
magician talk set - Press-Enterprise
A one-night only, pop-up exhibition of
vintage magic and variety arts posters
will include a talk by the owner of the
pieces, magician and magic historian,
Mike Caveney. The event will take place
at 7 p.m. Friday, May 31 at the
Riverside Art Museum in downtown
Riverside.
Publ.Date : 29 May 2013 00:00:00 -0700

Central Virginia Magicians' Competition
at the Gateway Theatre - Augusta Free
Press
Every magician would dream of having
this title, but the only way to win this
title is to be part of a magic
competition. Unfortunately there is none
in the Valley. That is until now! WTA’s
Gateway will fill that void with its
first WTA Virginia Magicians’
Competition. Hosted by master magician
Peter Monticup, the evening will feature
seven magicians vying for top honors in
the Saturday, June 1 magic slam...
Publ.Date : 29 May 2013 00:00:00 -0700

Abracadabra! 10 Stage Magician Movies &
The Tricks They Perform - Indie Wire
Really though, it’s just fun to be
fooled, and as many magician films deal
in meta-commentary on the nature of
filmmaking and deception, probably three
times that number are just aiming to be
a silly lark. Representing both camps,
then, we’ve pulled from a top hat a
string of ten knotted-together films
featuring prestidigitators good and bad,
mad and sane, in celebration of the art
of misdirection, sleight of hand and
illusion. Believe your eyes!...
Publ.Date : 30 May 2013 00:00:00 -0700

MOVIE REVIEW: 'Now You See Me' -
Washington Times
Just as big a problem is the way the
movie undercuts the allure of big-time
magic stage shows with its use of
mediocre computer-generated effects. The
magic of the movies may work well for
flying dragons and giant robots, but
it’s a poor way to communicate the
appeal of practical illusions. Without
those sorts of real-world
how’d-they-do-that questions to ground
the movie’s mysteries, I left this
magician-heist film feeling both tricked
and robbed...
Publ.Date : 30 May 2013 00:00:00 -0700

'Now You See Me': An Unconvincing Con
Job - NPR
Now You See Me, a con movie with magic
as its vehicle and twists fueling its
forward motion, exudes self-importance
and can't help but make promises it
can't deliver on... Better movies on
magicians have emphasized the trust
necessary in the relationship between
performer and audience. Now You See Me
might be forgiven for underdelivering on
its grand promises if it also didn't
treat its audience with smugness. You
wouldn't be blamed for taking up with
Ruffalo's character and just wanting to
shake down the filmmakers for your money
back.
Publ.Date : 30 May 2013 00:00:00 -0700

Suspending Disbelief, as 4 Flee
Handcuffs - New York Times
Up to this point, “Now You See Me” is an
enjoyable goof that in its giddy way
evokes a world propelled by
technological wizardry enabling those
who are clever enough to steal from
everybody else... Long before the story
culminates with a preposterous final
revelation, whatever hopes you had that
“Now You See Me” might have had anything
to say about the profession of magic,
rampant greed or anything else have been
dashed.
Publ.Date : 30 May 2013 00:00:00 -0700

Movie Review: For a Story About
Magicians, Now You See Me is - D
Magazine
The magic depicted in the film isn’t
particularly magical. The characters are
so weakly drawn that Harrelson fills the
vacuum as the same charming rapscallion
he’s been in other (better) movies and
Eisenberg is largely reprising his role
of Mark Zuckerberg from The Social
Network, though at least the two of them
are given more to do than Franco or
Fisher... And you might not guess the
final twist, but that’ll only be because
you’ll not want to face the possibility
that the story would choose to resort to
such a stupid cheat...
Publ.Date : 30 May 2013 00:00:00 -0700

Eisenberg plays brainy magician in 'Now
You See Me' - MetroNews Canada
In the case of “Now You See Me,”
Eisenberg plays J. Daniel Atlas, a
magician whose idea of a simple card
trick is beaming an image of his mark’s
chosen playing card onto the side a
skyscraper. Early in the film, Atlas as
well as three other skilled illusionists
-- a mentalist played by Woody
Harrelson, Isla Fisher’s escape artist
and a sleight-of-hand master portrayed
by Dave Franco -- are brought together
under mysterious circumstances and soon
begin performing together in Las Vegas
as the Four Horsemen. Among their highly
publicized, highly illegal tricks?
Draining a Parisien bank vault and
raining cash on their grateful Vegas
audience...
Publ.Date : 30 May 2013 00:00:00 -0700

'Now You See Me' review: Tricks but no
treat - The Star-Ledger - NJ.com
I do like magic, though, and movies
about magic. I enjoyed the recent Ricky
Jay documentary, and "The Great Buck
Howard." And I was very happy back in
2006, when we had two competing period
pieces -- "The Prestige" and "The
Illusionist" -- about tricky
prestidigitators. But while it takes the
art more seriously than this year's "The
Incredible Burt Wonderstone," "Now You
See Me" (which opens Thursday night)
ends up being nothing more than some
very clumsy cinema sleight-of-hand. It's
just smoke and mirrors and a few cheap
tricks.
Publ.Date : 30 May 2013 00:00:00 -0700

Now You See Me - Hollywood Reporter
Now You See Me is a superficially
diverting but substance-free concoction,
a would-be thriller as evanescent as a
magic trick and one that develops no
suspense or rooting interest because the
characters possess all the substance of
invisible ink....
Publ.Date : 30 May 2013 00:00:00 -0700

Now You See Me: The Customer Is Always
Fooled - TIME
The film’s magic feats were “inspired by
David Copperfield” and supervised by
David Kwong, a former DreamWorks
animation exec who founded The
Misdirectors Guild, a Hollywood club of
illusionists and puzzle mavens. Every
trick, from intimate business like
card-shuffling to biggies like making a
bank vault disappear, is deployed with
grandeur and stupefying grace.
Publ.Date : 30 May 2013 00:00:00 -0700

'Now You See Me' is a movie you should
see - now -Buffalo News
But here we’ve got a high-level cast
playing thieving Vegas mega-magicians –
a group of four individual virtuosi in
magic who come together to form the
Magic Act to End All Magic Acts: the
Four Horsemen... And when the movie
comes to a hugely satisfying conclusion
– all to prove its point that “the
closer you look, the less you see” – you
come to a thoroughly heartening
corollary conclusion..
Publ.Date : 30 May 2013 00:00:00 -0700

Review: 'Now You See Me' - San Antonio
Express
Thus, at all times in "Now You See Me,"
we are either watching people who don't
have much of a reason for doing what
they do, or people whose reasons are
hidden from us. This makes for a movie
that is entirely uninvolving, and that's
even before it gets stylistically
irritating. But the magicians are
charming, and that's a help --
particularly Woody Harrelson who is
fairly delightful in every scene he's
in. Too bad he's not in every scene.
Publ.Date : 30 May 2013 00:00:00 -0700

'See It'? Absolutely, if you like to
solve mysteries - Charlotte Observer
“Now You See Me” can’t quite claim to be
the ideal crime drama – that would be
“The Usual Suspects,” which justly won
an Oscar for its script – but it’s only
one level down. You might guess who’s
behind the skulduggery, especially as
you don’t have endless choices, but the
last pieces of the puzzle don’t snap
into place until the final scene...
Publ.Date : 30 May 2013 00:00:00 -0700

Magician and Saved by the Bell star
returning to Kings Island - FOX19
Ed Alonzo’s Psycho Circus of Magic &
Mayhem 2 will engage guests with
thrilling vanishing acts and incredible
stunts inside of Kings Island Theater.
Alonzo, the self-proclaimed “Misfit of
Magic”, is a two-time recipient of the
“Stage Magician of the Year” and “Comedy
Magician of the Year” awards from the
internationally recognized Academy of
Magical Arts (AMA) and is known for his
role on the hit television sitcom ‘Saved
by the Bell” (1989 to 1990) as Max, the
proprietor/magician of the local
restaurant hangout ‘The Max.’ ..
Publ.Date : 30 May 2013 00:00:00 -0700

Now You See Me: Why Movies About
Magicians Don't Work - Vulture
In general, however, the primary
shortcoming with movies about magic is
that they are almost always either
obvious or inapt — the former (like
1947's classic noir Nightmare Alley) in
that they tell us something we already
know (magic isn't real! It's a carefully
orchestrated trick!), and the latter
(like the middling 2008 John Malkovich
vehicle The Great Buck Howard, or Clive
Barker's 1995 horror show Lord of
Illusions) in that they suggest
something we know is a lie (magic really
is real!). In both instances, there's no
wonder, no excitement; all they can hope
for is shrugged-shoulder acknowledgement
of the execution...
Publ.Date : 31 May 2013 00:00:00 -0700

Deft Illusion: Now You See Me - The San
Francisco Appeal
Now You See Me is filled with
insufferable magicians, and no real
magic. And yet…I kind of liked it. Maybe
I should qualify that. Mark Ruffalo is
in it, and I will like, at least a
little bit, anything he’s in. I can’t
help it. I’m flesh and blood, people!
But he’s not the only thing likable
about the movie...
Publ.Date : 31 May 2013 00:00:00 -0700

Need to keep the art of magic alive:
magician Samrat Shankar
Noted magician Samrat Shankar today made
a fervent appeal to keep the art of
magic alive and said governments should
come forward to check its misuse for
commercial gains by some unscrupulous
people.
"I am concerned about the fading art of
magic and plan to set up an academy to
impart training to young people in
wonderful art of magic to produce good
professionals," he said while talking to
media persons.
Publ.Date : Sat, 01 Jun 2013 17:12:03
-0700